Science and Technology Diplomacy: a Theoretical Framework and Practical Suggestions

Science and technology diplomacy is still an emerging domain and not much academic literature has been published about it; hence، gathering together and placing the related concepts in order is a necessity. In the theoretical work، and this is one of the major functions of this paper. In this research، we introduce the emerging domain of science and technology diplomacy and two main approaches namely “science and technology oriented” and “diplomacy oriented”، in to related studies، explaining the necessity of this domain for our country; then we study experiences of the countries active in this area. Following this، we introduce a conceptual framework with six principal domains namely: science and technology، political sciences، economics، law، communications، and basic studies، along with some sub-domains and a brief description for each of them. Finally، this conceptual framework has been used to provide some practical suggestions in order to improve and develop the science and technology diplomacy of our country.